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rec50My Sheppard/McKay rec50 table.
Claim: Stargate Atlantis: John Sheppard/Rodney McKay
Title: Icelus
Author: eretria (![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
eretria)
Characters: McKay, Sheppard, Beckett, Weir, others
Prompt: 03 - Angst
Rating: Mature
Length: Epic
Brief summary: This story is an AU, starting from the end of season one, where Sheppard wasn't rescued by the Daedalus. Rodney blames himself for Sheppard's death in that if he could have modified the control chair to use as a remote for the jumpers in time, Sheppard would never have died. He's depressed and irritable, lashing out at others, and is apparently addicted to the stimulants Beckett injected him with during the siege. For his own good, Beckett has him sent to the mainland on mandatory medical leave -- a chance to recover, to work through some of his guilt and grief.
Only -- Rodney dreams.
Lush imagery, solid characterization, and sharp emotional intensity, this story keeps everything under a tight reign, and tiny details mean big things. There is a prequel short, Hypnos and Phobetor which is in Elizabeth's POV and sets up the initial AU version of the world.
In his dreams, he was walking. More stumbling, really. Barely holding himself up, fighting his way through dense vegetation; through vines, strong as ivy slings, thorns on them like roses. They left scratches along his face, ripped the skin from his arms, made it almost impossible to move forward. When he finally cut through the thickets, he fell - a sickening plummet down, down, down, never-ending freefall, the sensation making his stomach revolt. He hit water, plunging in deep, And then the sensation of falling was replaced by that of drowning, the fall knocking the wind out of him and now his lungs were screaming, but he couldn’t come up and couldn’t surface and couldn’t breathe and was heavy, so heavy, and it would have been so easy to just let go, but he needed air, air, air; blood rushing in his ears, panic climbing higher and he only needed to kick his legs to breach the water’s surface, but it was surrounding him and cocooning him and luring him, up and down had lost their meaning and he was tired, so tired and just breathing in would be so easy …
When he woke up gasping for breath, with the feeling of water in his lungs, he understood the metaphorical quality of those dreams, didn’t need Heightmeyer to explain them to him. Heightmeyer, who wasn’t around any longer to do any explaining.
The Wraith had taken many. She had been among the first.
After the nightmares started, he avoided sleep even more. It was overrated anyway. Nothing some fake coffee and a good dose of stimulants couldn’t fix.
Those left of his team shied away from him now. He had overheard two of them talking about Major Sheppard’s sacrifice and had manhandled them out of the lab they’d been working in, yelling at them to not enter it again until they had left their personal feelings at the door. He had never been the most patient of men, but this was unusually harsh behaviour, even for him. Part of him knew this. The other part snarled angrily and told him to stop being such a sensitive fool. There was work to be done here.
Things went progressively worse from that moment on.
Link to the story: Icelus
Claim: Stargate Atlantis: John Sheppard/Rodney McKay
Title: Icelus
Author: eretria (
eretria)Characters: McKay, Sheppard, Beckett, Weir, others
Prompt: 03 - Angst
Rating: Mature
Length: Epic
Brief summary: This story is an AU, starting from the end of season one, where Sheppard wasn't rescued by the Daedalus. Rodney blames himself for Sheppard's death in that if he could have modified the control chair to use as a remote for the jumpers in time, Sheppard would never have died. He's depressed and irritable, lashing out at others, and is apparently addicted to the stimulants Beckett injected him with during the siege. For his own good, Beckett has him sent to the mainland on mandatory medical leave -- a chance to recover, to work through some of his guilt and grief.
Only -- Rodney dreams.
Lush imagery, solid characterization, and sharp emotional intensity, this story keeps everything under a tight reign, and tiny details mean big things. There is a prequel short, Hypnos and Phobetor which is in Elizabeth's POV and sets up the initial AU version of the world.
In his dreams, he was walking. More stumbling, really. Barely holding himself up, fighting his way through dense vegetation; through vines, strong as ivy slings, thorns on them like roses. They left scratches along his face, ripped the skin from his arms, made it almost impossible to move forward. When he finally cut through the thickets, he fell - a sickening plummet down, down, down, never-ending freefall, the sensation making his stomach revolt. He hit water, plunging in deep, And then the sensation of falling was replaced by that of drowning, the fall knocking the wind out of him and now his lungs were screaming, but he couldn’t come up and couldn’t surface and couldn’t breathe and was heavy, so heavy, and it would have been so easy to just let go, but he needed air, air, air; blood rushing in his ears, panic climbing higher and he only needed to kick his legs to breach the water’s surface, but it was surrounding him and cocooning him and luring him, up and down had lost their meaning and he was tired, so tired and just breathing in would be so easy …
When he woke up gasping for breath, with the feeling of water in his lungs, he understood the metaphorical quality of those dreams, didn’t need Heightmeyer to explain them to him. Heightmeyer, who wasn’t around any longer to do any explaining.
The Wraith had taken many. She had been among the first.
After the nightmares started, he avoided sleep even more. It was overrated anyway. Nothing some fake coffee and a good dose of stimulants couldn’t fix.
Those left of his team shied away from him now. He had overheard two of them talking about Major Sheppard’s sacrifice and had manhandled them out of the lab they’d been working in, yelling at them to not enter it again until they had left their personal feelings at the door. He had never been the most patient of men, but this was unusually harsh behaviour, even for him. Part of him knew this. The other part snarled angrily and told him to stop being such a sensitive fool. There was work to be done here.
Things went progressively worse from that moment on.
Link to the story: Icelus
